Name: Ethan Smith
Leadership Charlotte (LC) Class: 36
Title/Company: Budget Manager – City of Charlotte
Hometown: Waynesville, North Carolina
Education:Masters of Public Administration – The University of North Carolina at Charlotte
Current personal or leadership goals:
To raise 2 strong and independent girls (currently 4 and 1) and continue to build a team of solution-oriented public servants that can help Charlotte keep pace as one of the fastest growing cities in the country.
What advice would you give to current Leadership Charlotte participants?
Prioritize the time to be with your class. Life will go on as quickly as it always does after graduation, but even all these years later those connections, memories and eye-opening experiences continue to drive me to want to be a better version of myself.
What’s a lesson that you learned through LC that has stuck with you and why?
That in order to be a leader you need to empower and build up new leaders.
What would you like to see Leadership Charlotte alumni get involved in and why?
Our public schools. We ask so much of our education professionals: to teach, to nurture, to provide security and reassurance, to recognize the uniqueness of our children but treat them equitably. Just as with so many in public service, it’s hard for the average person to really grasp how complex and relentless the job is. The next generation depends on it.
Favorite way to spend a weekend in Charlotte:
Really anything with family. I’m lucky to have a lot of family here in Charlotte and there’s just so much to do here. We are lucky to have so much great live entertainment to support, from Children’s Theatre to the Blumenthal and our professional sports teams are all only a year away from their first championship.
Favorite nonprofit or community organization in Charlotte and why:
Right Moves for Youth has been in this community for more than 35 years helping young people make the most of their education, build social capital (long before it was trendy), and find opportunity. RMFY has active volunteers and small groups in 20 schools in CMS and if they were in 120 the future of Charlotte would be that much brighter.